New Length of Chalk Stream Created in Hampshire

By Terry Lawton

For nearly 100 years watercress has been farmed on the headwaters
of the Bourne Rivulet at St Mary Bourne, Hampshire. The watercress
farm was developed by Eliza Fleet, who was known in London as The
Watercress Queen, and trademarked the name Vitacress in 1929. The
growth of the watercress farm has, over many years, had an effect
on the Bourne, particularly above the famous viaduct.

The Bourne Rivulet and its trout fishing was immortalised by Harry
Plunket Greene in his classic book Where The Bright Waters Meet.
The Bourne Rivulet is the uppermost tributary of the river Test.
The "bright waters" of the book's title are the confluence of
the Test and the Bourne.

Lower Link Farm, which is owned by Vitacress Salads Ltd, is sited
at the perennial headwaters of the Bourne. Spring water is used
to irrigate the watercress beds and use to be returned to the
Bourne, along with wash-water from the packing plant, through a
series of pipes and enclosed culverts which have always held a
population of wild brown trout. At the start of 2007 the company
removed these pipes and culverts and employed Cain Bio-Engineering,
the specialist river restoration company, to convert them into
new miniature chalk streams which has added to the fishable
waters on the Bourne, populated as they are by some impressive
trout.

The basic channels produced by removing the underground pipes
and culverts which Cain Bio-Engineering converted into new
miniature high-quality chalk streams. This photograph was
taken at the end of February, 2007.

The work, which involved the creation of completely new features
within an excavated channel, was a rare opportunity to create
ideal trout habitat from the stream bed up. The habitat with
its pools, glides and riffles is now home to the resident
population of trout. These streams have been colonised by
trout of all year classes and even young bullheads – an
important indicator of water quality - are present. Other
fish from down stream have moved up into the new waters
where they have the right geomorphology – physical features
– and biological features such as weeds and
macro-invertebrates to flourish and thrive.

Kick sampling in the new streams has shown that there are
large numbers of Gammarus available to the fish, along with
many varieties of Caddis and Ephemerids.

Local landowner Michael Malyon fishing the left-hand of
the two channels in the photograph of the start of the
project. This photograph was taken in June, 2007 and the
new plantings and sowings can be seen to be growing well.

By creating the key physical features for the four life stages
of trout, most of the main habitat requirements for other trout
food species will be created by default. Logs and brushwood
have been incorporated into the new banks and margins at key
locations. This woody debris will provide key egg-laying sites
for Ephemerids and good nursery habitat for nymphs and
invertebrates. Low-level banks that can easily over-top during
periods of high water have also been included.